Ahoy!

What a coincidence that I happen to start a blog just as the New Year rings in... I suppose I’ll take that as a good sign and perhaps a possible New Years resolution to keep writing?  As of yet, I have no other resolution (except to be happy, but that is something we should aim for every day of every year).  Anyway, I guess I should give whoever is reading this the basics:  My name is Arielle, I’m 22 and I graduated from the University of Maryland in May with a degree in English. YIKES. That's right, I'm just a small town girl living in a post grad world, to butcher the words of Journey.  So what exactly does that entail?  Well to give you an idea, I am writing this from the couch in my parents' living room as I await my shift working retail at the mall for practically minimum wage.  Did I mention I make less money than I did when I was 16?  Ahh, life. 

However, I DID start with a plan.

Post Grad Plan A:  I should actually call this my ONLY post grad plan.  In October, I left for Ft. Lauderdale, Florida to pursue a career as a yacht stewardess.  Basically my plan was to live and work aboard a large luxury yacht, have no living expenses and travel the world on someone else’s dime.  Sounds ideal, right?  Yeah, I thought so too.  I never considered that leaving all of my friends, family, and boyfriend indefinitely might not be all smooth sailing (pun definitely intended).  I was miserable.  Not just unhappy, or upset, or any other synonym; but MISERABLE.  I didn’t eat for a week, battled bed bugs, obnoxious alcoholic roommates, and cockroaches (also roommates) just to name a few factors.  However, I did catch up on episodes of Dexter and How I Met Your Mother whilst hiding out in my room for hours on end, unable to sleep.   Nevertheless, I pushed through and after a weekend visit from my mom, finished my certification classes, printed copies of my CV (curriculum vitae/resume), got business cards printed, and began dockwalking.  For those of you not in the yachtie world, “dockwalking” is a practice in which you literally walk up and down docks, acting as your own salesperson and handing out CV’s and business cards to anyone who will take them.  It is extremely awkward at the beginning, exhausting, and ego crushing, in a matter of words.  Needless to say, I hated dockwalking.  You can’t even believe some of the interactions that occur.  I knew of one instance in which a captain told a girl that she “wasn’t what the owner was looking for”.  When asked what exactly that meant, he replied, “blonde hair and big boobs.”  True. Story.  I should have known this might be the case when I was told that headshots were required on every CV. 

The yachting industry is truly not for everyone.  In the end, I ran out of money and had no potential jobs lined up so I packed my bags and headed home for Thanksgiving.  And boy was I thankful this time.